中国遭遇国际NPE大规模诉讼的可能性分析

The Possibility Analysis on China's Being Sued by Massive International NPEs' Litigation

NPE即专利非实施体,又称为"专利流氓",其通过专利诉讼活动来获取利益。目前NPE活动主要集中在欧美,但是2016年11月国际知名WI-LAN旗下的公司在中国针对索尼提起了专利诉讼,由此引发中国遭遇大规模NPE诉讼的担忧。而美国政府和欧盟当局的很多研究报告中指出NPE的滥诉行为对创新、初创企业发展和专利制度本身目的的实现是有很多不利影响的。正是在这样的背景下,笔者进行了大量的法律调查,以分析国际NPE诉讼活动的原因和特点。再结合中国专利制度的具体情形,以及国际NPE在华专利布局情况对中国遭遇大规模国际NPE诉讼的可能性做初步分析。最后在上述分析和法律调查的基础上为中国应对大规模NPE诉讼提出一点建议。

NPEs（non-practicing entities） are entities that don＇t practice their own patents. NPEs are also often called ＂patent trolls＂ who particularly make profits through patent litigations. The NPEs＇ activities are mainly existing in the USA and European countries at present. But in November 2016, one of affiliates of WILAN, an international famous NPE, has filed a patent litigation against Sony in China. This case has raised a great concern that international NPEs will come to China. Some reports from authorities of the USA and the EU state the damage caused by NPEs to innovation, start-up companies and purpose of patent system itself. Under this background, firstly, this paper analyzes the reasons and characteristics of NPEs＇ past activities based on a mass of legal investigations. Secondly, combining the foregoing analysis with the Chinese specific situation of patent system and the investigations on patent layouts made by some biggest NPEs, a preliminary analysis on whether China will be next venue of massive patent litigation filed by international NPEs is conducted. At last several suggestions are proposed on China＇s countermeasures to NPEs＇ massive patent litigation on the basis of the analysis above and legal research I did.